jokin

Not only a contrarian, this is a Reusse's Reality-esque satiristic "Modest Proposal" of the likes that would almost make Jonathan Swift blush. Either that, or the Reusse-Reality is early onset senility rearing its ugly head.

Are you really as obtuse as oldnurse? Really?

Because it is a very silly statement, with virtually a zero % likelihood of happening, bordering on malfeasance if it did happen . And this coming from a guy who. in the very same paragraph, says "a professional approach" is what he aspires to for the team as its #1 goal for 2013. Not a very professional way to kick the season off, TR.

This is in all likelihood Gardy's last year on the bench, with his possible replacement sitting next to him, his relevance is ebbing daily . Ryan made a curious public statement regarding Mauer's status, to say the least. The statement contradicts the contract extension to Doumit. The statement contradicts the very successful plan that he and Gardy hatched in 2012. The statement jeopardizes the investment still committed to Mauer for the next 6 years. The statement contradicts common sense for what Ryan has already admitted is a lost season, a season that- according to Ryan- the best that fans can hope for, is to "treasure" a professional approach over wins and losses.

See above:talk028:

So you are willing to entertain the notion that Ryan was merely blowing PR smoke with this bombast? IMO, 100 games at C is a "fine number", in what they've already essentially admitted is a lost season. They extended Doumit for more than the going rate for just "insurance" at C plus DHing. I want Joe to "offer the far and away best option behind the plate" through the 2018 season. More physical breakdowns, like after 2008 and 2010 are more likely, not less, with similar workloads, as he continues into his 30s.

This is shortsighted thinking. They just extended 2 extra years to a guy to play 60 games at catcher. You have a GM who at the 2013 gala fanfest "kick off" just publicly set the bar for Gardenhire so low that the bar resembles a limbo stick: "As long as things go according to plan here ... obviously, even if we struggle to some extent, you look at control of the clubhouse, injuries that we should not have to worry about, the professional approach that we all treasure, those are the types of things that I'm looking at more than wins and losses." "If Joe is healthy and wants to catch", you still have to be mindful that he isn't the boss and doesn't sign his own paychecks. The Twins have a significant potential liability on the books in Mauer and need to protect their investment, particularly in a year when they are pathetically pulling this chestnut of "Iron Joe" out in an attempt to sell some tickets rather than as some proviso that Joe's fully on board at Fulll-Time catching duties to make a legitimate run at a title.

Twins Fest attendance at 24000 this year, down from 30000 last year (-20%). Season ticket sales and single game sales down about 19%. So is the back-to-back years of payroll cutting "good business practices" or self-fulfilling prophecy realized?

They didn't need to even "go after" Lannan, he was still under Nats control at the time they acquired Meyer. Could have easily been a throw-in. He might have cost slightly more in trade than on the FA market, but they certainly would have had a better asset at a cheaper price than Correia, better durability than Correia and most importantly, not gotten stuck with 2 years of Correia.

Agreed on the one part of your hypothesis- The poorly prepared pitchers (and not just the rookies), in regard to holding runners on properly, are a significant part of the putrid CS rates. But if you look at the numbers, combined with the eye test, his once-amazing catching abilities have been in decline, since coming back from major injury in May, 2009.

Correction- Because Mauer WAS a really good defensive catcher- his defensive metrics have slipped badly the last 2 years. Regardless, I agree that they are a better team with him catching. But keeping him healthy for the last 6 years on his contract trumps that fact on the priority scale Perhaps the reason would be that he has only played over 120 games as a catcher in a season once? (That was 135 games started at C in 2008 [139 played] when he was a 25-year old youngster, and he's been dealing with major health issues ever since.) I think 100 games for Mauer behind the plate with Doumit getting 62 starts would be ideal if it isn't deleterious to Mauer's health (Doumit caught 59 games last year and 60 the year before at Pittsburgh.) 0 for Butera.

On flippable assets, you're not really getting this. You build depth from below, in that you then create expendable tradeable & coveted assets- these theoretically become Perkins and Burton- if they continue their progression. Hopefully, they can be traded for prospects at positions of weakness as the position players come off the books and the draft picks move up to take the place of your tradeable assets from a now-developing position of strength. The WAR question in your first paragraph is key, it's not so much a goal as "turning a season around" all by itself. Create areas of strength and depth in as efficient a manner as possible, thus developing incremental improvements in each aspect of the team. Making a proposed turnaround in the bullpen in the proportions close to what I outlined is certain to make the 1000s of players and agents around the various levels of baseball sit up and take notice, particularly the bounty of potential FA starters this offseason, for example, in making the Twins recognized as a team serious about developing a consistent winner. Range of opinion on the SPs I proffered? Their numbers and projections suggest how mediocre to very good they are, opinions may vary, sure. Jackson went to the Cubs, Marcum to the Mets, McCarthy to the D-Backs. Sorry... but Winning/Losing wasn't the make or break factor on ANY these deals. Nuff said here. On the proposed SP pick-ups, even those such as the lowly #4-5 projections like Lannan and Francis, they sadly all represent potential upgrades, to at least some, if not most, on this lowly Twins pitching depth chart, and they were available for spit, and represented potential value when compared to Correia or Saunders. Again, incremental improvement-seeking, building the franchise back up one brick at a time, finding the next Burton, Dickey, Diamond along the way is all part of that dynamic process.

Works both ways. "Few other options" must have been where Pelfrey was then already, for him to jump on such an early low-ball offer from a crummy team like the Twins, and with far more "frozen tundra" headaches to deal with and far fewer "cultural amenities" and "endorsement opportunities" in the Big Apple- ahh, Minneapolis, a cold Omaha, indeed.

I think the debate on TD hasn't gone on longer than the sum total of about 3 minutes regarding the lack of signing the high end FA by the Twins. Only the rubest of rubes holds out some silly wanderlustic notion about a Greinke, Sanchez or Pujols signing in Minnesota. Do you consider the likes of Jackson, Blanton or Marcum, Myers, McCarthy "high end"? These are tier 2/3 guys, slightly above mediocre to good, and all better than anything the Twins envision in their rotation. What the heck, Francis and Lannan for peanuts would have been a huge depth upgrade at the back end of the rotation. .You're conflating "marginal" talent with "serviceable" talent. You talk about "marginal talent available", the Twins pitching staff depth chart has "marginal" written in the margins, and everywhere else on the roster page. The Twins only have 4 returning pitchers from 2012 (Diamond, Duensing, Burton and Perkins) who were more than a sneezful above replacement level. With the exception of Hendriks, their bottom 7-in-terms-of-WAR pitchers (Blackburn, Swarzak, Deduno, Walters, Burnett and DeVries) could all come down with a case of career-ending River Blindness tomorrow and it would have no significant negative effect on the team's prospects, that's why they are termed (at, or below) "replacement level". Spot on, on Padilla, you could sign 4 mythical, but desciptively "marginal", but still "serviceable", Padilla-like RP's who had a 0.5 WAR in 2012, for less than $10M total, dump the whole bullpen except Duensing, Fien, Burton and Perkins and your WAR goes up by 2.0 versus the -1.2 for the guys you dumped-------- Remember, the Twins entire bullpen net WAR value for 2012 was only 2.5. The likes of a guy who couldn't even get a contract in the States like Padilla, could be the key to vaulting the 3rd worst bullpen in 2012, as rated by xFIP, into nearly the top quintile bullpen group in all of baseball (behind only 6 teams @ 6.0 WAR , for only $10M invested (net cost, $6-$7M). You don't even necessarily have to find another Burton, just 4 guys who would average out for you the 0.5 WAR score/man like Padilla rated in 2012. You would get 200 innings (+ additional 2013 innings factored in throughout the pen) with an xFIP of 3.69 from Padilla versus the 278 innings of ~5.00+ xFIP dreck from Gray and the gang in 2012. A huge upgrade for little marginal increased cost of say $6-$7M. Money well spent? Flippable assets created from a new-found position of strength? I think so.

Sign me up. I also found a Diaz opposite field gapper to the wall on Youtube. In the field, he looks serviceable at Second, hitting-wise there's no one close in the Twins MI to this "Toy Cannon". Would the Twins thinking be that they can stand pat until Rosario gets here in approximately 2015? My impression would be that you would sign this guy with the intention of treating him like Cespedes and calling him up sooner rather than later.

Would that be addition by inaction? That could be the best move since trading for Meyer.

Metaphor Mixmaster strikes again. Hard to know why I bother, but the argument was why Pelfrey would leave the big market and big opportunity on a team in desperate need of pitching. News flash, guys who get non-tendered often re-sign with their old clubs, sometimes at a discount. The Mets chose to pursue Marcum and decline on Pelfrey, the Twins chose to pursue Pelfrey and decline on Marcum, both signed at the same base salary, First year after TJ historical results suggests the Twins, with their 1-year deal with no team option on year 2, took on more risk than the Mets. It's really not hard to ascertain which team played the odds for success out of their deals better. Mea Culpa on the TJ date, too many google searches for TJ dates for prospective Twins pitchers this offseason. That still leaves it likely that Pelfrey is unable to start out in the rotation and puts a big question mark about when he might regain his career-level of effectiveness.

Sometimes, you forget that you know what you know. Thanks Willihammer for remembering the most cogent point yet in shutting down this ridiculous argument foisted upon us by Ryan and dutifully perpetuated ad nauseum on TD.

I'm not sure the "trend is your friend". If you would have said he'd done what you said he did in 2 out of the last 7 years, I might have been persuaded: YEAR ERA xFIP 2006 4.71 4.37 2007 4.44 4.39 2008 3.41 4.59 2009 4.60 4.74 2010 4.47 4.50 2011 3.69 4.38 2012 4.07 4.25 His ERA over the last 3 years is 4.07, not really a big premium over his 4.38 xFIP, even with the big year of 2011 averaged in. Given the current state of the Twins Swiss Cheese defense, a veritable Pitch to Contact Zenmaster like Saunders should be the last pitcher the Twins should covet on a likely overbid necessary to obtain him. And I know you mentioned his HR% at least as a concern, but don't try to gloss over the fact that RH batters will be licking their chops as they look to become very familiar with the the Left Field stands at TF plus with a chance to increase on their already lofty .804 career OPS against him. (In effect, every RHB averages out close to the equivalent of a Bryce Harper). Besides his high Gopher ball rate against righties, his career FIP against them is 4.95. I am resigned to attempting to sign him, but not for the numbers bandied about on TD, and not long-term.

And many of our fans are more than happy with it:

Actually, at least 4 out of 5 won't "help immediately". It's highly likely one or more may never "help" in any difference-making way. Once again, the Twins have placed themselves in a position with only a pallid "Plan A" in place, wherein virtually every variable has to come up "Aces", merely for the team to have a shot at mediocrity.

In retrospect, the Baker fiasco started the Def-con 5 All Hands On Deck Panic Mode to sign a Correia, the numbers certainly fit, and so does the mis-evaluation of "a pretty darn good pitcher" (Not...). How do you then follow that up a few days later and throw a one-year deal at a TJ pitcher and not get a team option on the 2nd year, you know, the year when he most likely would be effective? It appears that Ryan got completely pwned on both deals. How else but panic-mode do you explain how they missed this badly on Marcum? I am severely dissenting on the notion floated recently on TD that Ryan is still a sharp operator. He certainly hasn't acquitted himself very well with any distinction concerning addressing the starting pitching this offseason

Early morning LOL TD highlight of the day.

And I foolishly got sucked into this thread thinking the Twins were calling on Carter Capps. I find it hard to fathom that the Twins FO haven't deleted Matt Capps' number from their speed dial.

Too tall, inferior career stats. And, why hire an imposter when we have the original elfin-character locked up for 2 more years? May as well get Bartlett and Kelly Johnson.